Pages

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Chocolate and Fig Preserve Cupcakes

Just about four months ago my best friend K and her husband J brought a lovely new human into this world. Their new baby is happy, laughing, and good natured...seemingly content with everything going around her and pleased with the attentions of her family (including her big sister, my awesomely terrific godchild!).

How wonderful it must be to be a child...napping and drinking milk, having people bathe you and comb your hair. I sometimes wish I could go back to that time, if only to relish this life of being absolutely care-free. I would store this feeling for stormier times to come, when I can then take it out and rub it against my cheek like a blankie.

Then again, I don’t know how long I could be on a diet consisting of milk and milk.

I suppose there is a lot to be said about every stage in life, and the important thing is to make sure we don’t forget to savor each one – embracing all the good that comes with the moment you are in. Like being a child (Kids, don’t try to grow up too fast! You will miss those carefree days when you have rent to pay!). Like being an adult (Yay! My own kitchen...all the raw cake batter I can eat!).

And for all ages, except the strictly milk-drinking set, there’s chocolate cupcakes...

- Place butter in a saucepan and put over low heat to melt. When it is almost completely melted, add chocolate. Once the chocolate has softened a bit, remove the pan from heat and stir until chocolate is completely melted and the mixture is smooth.- Add the fig preserves, sugar, salt, and eggs to the chocolate mixture, then mix until everything is well incorporated. Stir in the flour, to which you’ve added the baking powder (do not overmix!).- Pour into a 12-bun muffin tin lined with papers and bake in an 180C oven for 25-30 minutes, or until toothpick comes out fairly clean.- Cool in the pan on a rack for 10 minutes before turning out. Wait to cool completely before icing.- For the icing, melt chocolate and cream in a saucepan over low heat. Remove from heat and whisk until it’s smooth and thick. Ice the cupcakes, smoothing it out with the back of a spoon or a spatula. Garnish with a candied nut on each – I used candied pili nuts.

The changes I made to the recipe were substituting the original cherry jam with fig preserves, and using a mixture of all purpose flour and baking powder instead of self-raising flour (which I didn’t have)...and using candied nuts instead of glace cherries for garnish. If you own this book you will notice that the recipe is pretty much the same as her Chocolate Orange Cake a few pages earlier (which I adapted for Yummy Magazine last march), using the cherry jam instead of the orange marmalade. I love both the orange cake and this fig preserve cupcake version – adding the jam/marmalade/preserves to the batter does two things: it yields a moist and rich cake as opposed to a light and spongy one, and it gives another dimension of flavour...the fruit underlying the chocolate. It also makes for a supremely satisfying raw cake batter to lick off everything! I will be experimenting with other fruit preserves soon...

I made these to take to K’s house for a small tea party. We sat outdoors and enjoyed K’s lovely spread of tea sandwiches (in a proper multi-tiered, afternoon-tea-type tray) and buttermilk scones with cream cheese icing. We chatted and played with the baby and whiled the afternoon away together...enjoying the moment :)

One day we will introduce K’s little one to chocolate...and I hope to be present on that special occasion. Until then, she’s happy chugging away at her milky sustenance and we are happy just to watch (while having tea and scones and cupcakes) :)

Yummy, yummy!! I often wonder, since most people say that cooking can be done according to taste but baking involves following the recipes to the letter, how baking recipes come about in the first place - knowing just how much flour (and of what type), sugar, eggs etc. to put in. Now I know. When one reaches your level of baking expertise, you can adapt and make them up, and always with delicious results!

Hi Anh! Congratulations to your best friend! My hubby loves milk too...drinks big glasses of it! So we actually do consume a lot of it in our home :)

Thanks Rosa!

Hi Meeta! Thanks! I do like milk a lot but yes, would need more than that for my grown up self! ;)

Oh Midge! I’m afraid you have to wait a bit...between milk a chocolate there’s all sorts of other things that need to come first...like squashed carrots. But I know exactly what you mean...I would love to see someone have chocolate (and sushi and foie and truffles!) for the very first time :)

Hi Iyor! Heehee, I’m not quite an expert...I never change the basic structure of a baked recipe. Like here I replaced 300 grams cherry jam with 300 grams fig preserve...same volume and Nigella did suggest we could try other preserves :) As for the flour, if you don’t have self-raising flour you can sub AP flour and baking powder...you can find the substitutions online! The first bakers must have gone through a lot of trial and error!

Hi BowlofMush! I love fig preserves...so this was a natural pick for me!

Hi Veron! Me too! I am still thinking though of which cupcakes will deserve your gorgeous wrappers! :)

Oh, two of my favorite things in one little cup! I'm sure it's delicious. It does seem like Goddess Nigella can do no wrong. My sister baked the Quadruple Choc. Cake recently, and it was as good as you said.

K can bake cream cheese frosted scones?! How divine that sounds!

Given this topic, I am wondering what the next post will be about... ;-D

Hi Kathie! You have a fig tree in your backyard??? Oh can we be friends? :)

Hi Katrina! This is like the recipe for the orange chocolate cake I made but using fig preserves instead of the marmalade (and making them cupcakes)...I loved it! Yes, K did...her first time ever to make scones and they were yummy :)

Hi Erin! Me too :)

Hi Ribbiticus! Hehe...or anyone who has no limits to chocolate intake!

I would love to be a baby too...only I am getting to be lactose intolerant! ;D hahaha Imagine a lactose intolerant baby??? perhaps I can just nurse on soy? hahaha ;P

Those cupcakes look absolutely DELICIOUS joey! Kids must love you coming over =) That outdoor tea party sounds great...you don't have pics of those yummy tea sandwiches by any chance?---so we may lust over them over the net! hahaha

Hi Jen! Oh no...although I love soy milk too :) Thanks! No photos of the tea sandwiches...I had no idea she would go to town with the whole afternoon tea setup! Next time for sure :) You take care too!